Committee approves ban on foreign waste to Utah

After a powerful House member literally sang about why importing 20,000 tons of Italian low-level radioactive waste to Utah is a bad idea, a House committee on Thursday endorsed a bill to block it.

The House Energy and Commerce Committee voted 34-12 to pass the bill by Reps. Jim Matheson, D-Utah, and Bart Gordon, D-Tenn., and send it to the full House for consideration.

The bill would block an EnergySolutions proposal to import 20,000 tons of such waste from Italy, process it in Tennessee and dump it in Utah's west desert. Such waste includes lab coats, shoe cloths and cleaning cloths used at nuclear-power plants.

Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., chairman of a subcommittee that earlier held hearings on the bill and also endorsed it, chose just before the vote to sing about why the bill is needed. He belted out new lyrics to "That's Amore."

"When the trash piles up high, reaches up to the sky, no amore," he sang.

"Roman nuclear waste, will it come to the states to be dumped? It may come, 20,000 tons, 20,000 tons! Utah says: That's no bella.

"We don't want that imported junk, that imported junk, hold on fellas. Excusa me, NRC, we and old Tennessee say, 'No more-ay.' "

The rest of the debate was more serious.

"There's only one country in the world that accepts low-level radioactive waste from other nations for permanent disposal," Gordon said. "That is the United States."

Markey added, "We on this committee will not allow the United States to be the world's nuclear-dumping ground."

And Matheson said, "Let Italy, Brazil, Mexico, Great Britain and other countries handle their own radioactive waste." Proposals to bring waste to Utah from Mexico and Brazil are also pending.

Republicans on the committee opposed the bill, saying EnergySolutions' operations are legal and create jobs, and blocking such waste could hurt the company and trade. They also disputed Democrats' claims that importing the foreign waste could take storage space needed for U.S. waste.

Republicans proposed an amendment to allow importing waste if studies show that ample room is available at disposal facilities for both U.S. and foreign waste, but the amendment died on a 26-17 vote.

EnergySolutions previously told the Deseret News it figures the bill will pass in the House, but the company hopes to block it in the Senate.

The company has proposed to use no more than 4.3 acres at its Clive, Tooele County, facility for disposing of foreign low-level radioactive waste.

While the legislative battle proceeds, a court battle on the same issue also is pending.

EnergySolutions successfully argued in federal court that it is a private facility and not part of a national compact system set up to let regions control what nuclear-plant wastes they may import, so Utah and a Northwest compact could not stop it from importing foreign waste.

That case is now on appeal.

e-mail: lee@desnews.com